Britain and Europe: Devolution and Foreign Policy

After the results of the September 1997 referendums in Scotland and Wales, devolution within the United Kingdom has become a certainty. This article considers the implications of the establishment of a Scottish parliament and a Welsh assembly for 'British' foreign policy. The author traces views of 'Britishness' from the beginning of the century, when 'home for all' had a brief vogue during the imperial heyday, through the mid-century period when an essentially anglocentric 'Britishness' seemed relatively uncontroversial, to the more contentious scene opened up by the end of empire, the retreat of the Commonwealth and the increasing prominence of the European Community/Union. He examines the new Labour government's official statements on the remit of the devolved institutions and considers the prospects after devolution for a UK foreign policy that is more genuinely 'British' than before, and for the emergence of, in particular, a distinctively 'Scottish' foreign policy.